On the night of 27 September 2025, four-year-old Gus Lamont went missing in the South Australian outback.
Police said the toddler was last seen “playing in the sand” on the family’s sprawling property, Oak Park Sheep Station.
Gus, the son of Jessica and Joshua Lamont, had “wandered off” in the past, according to his family, but he had always been found.
His family contacted the police that night, which prompted “one of the largest, most intensive searches ever undertaken” in the air, water, and on land.
Still, there was no sight of the toddler. Nor any evidence as to his whereabouts.
After eight separate searches, police still had no answers.
In February 2026, they officially declared Gus’ disappearance a major crime in a press conference.
Detective Superintendent Fielke said police had ruled out an abduction, and instead were focused on another theory.
“The person who has withdrawn their cooperation is now considered a suspect in the disappearance of Gus.”
He didn’t identify the suspect, but clarified that Gus’ parents were not being investigated.
Four months later, Gus’ grandmother Josie Murray told Seven Spotlight she believes police consider her a suspect.
Speaking to Seven Spotlight, the 75-year-old denied any involvement in the disappearance of her grandson.
“They’ve said they don’t think I’ve hurt him, they think that I’ve buried him — that’s one of the theories they’re working on,” Murray told Seven.
“For so many reasons it’s ludicrous. It doesn’t make sense. Why would you do that to yourself?”
Josie Murray spoke to Seven Spotlight about her grandson’s disappearance. Image: Seven
Back in February, Murray also released a joint statement with Gus’ other grandmother, her ex-wife Shannon Murray, claiming the family had “cooperated fully with the investigation and want nothing more than to find Gus and reunite him with his mum and dad.”
Murray, who is a transgender woman, was married to Shannon before she transitioned. They are the parents of Gus’ mother, Jess Murray, and remain friends and business partners on the sheep station.
On the night of Gus’ disappearance, at 5:30pm, Murray told Seven that she and Jess were on the verandah when Shannon told them Gus was missing.
She claimed that Shannon said she’d last seen Gus at 5pm, playing near what they call the “bomb shelter.”
The three women then went to search for him; first on foot, then on motorbikes.
“I don’t know what time that was, but after we’d searched on foot, I remember saying ‘we’ve got 45 minutes of daylight, we better get on with it’,” Murray said.
The 75-year-old claimed they searched until dark, before eventually returning home and calling police around 8pm.
Before authorities arrived, Murray claimed during the interview that she started to believe Gus had been abducted after allegedly spotting tyre tracks and signs that a bedstead and weather station had been moved.
“These wheel tracks were a small tyre, a medium-sized car, and not much tread on them,” she said. “It was definitely a passenger type. And I thought that’s strange too,” she said.
“I started to think, almost immediately, I wonder if someone’s come in.”
Murray also alleged she found a footprint which matched Gus’ shoes, but claimed it was dismissed by police.
She said authorities informed her that nearby security cameras showed nobody entering the property around the time of Gus’ disappearance.
Gus Lamont went missing in September 2025. Image: South Australia Police
The 75-year-old then claimed she suggested police review footage from a different camera, but was told it wasn’t working.
Crime reporter Hannah Foord reiterated to Seven the police have “almost certainly” ruled out an abduction, saying it was “so unlikely” someone would be so “opportunistic” to enter the remote property.
Earlier this month, Murray appeared in Adelaide court for owning a gun silencer, which police found in a safe room on the property.
The offence was not related to Gus’ disappearance, and the court heard that Murray owned the silencer prior to gun law reforms which followed the Bondi attacks.
After pleading guilty, the 75-year-old was fined $10,500 and given a temporary ban on possessing firearms.
Towards the end of her interview with Seven, Murray said: “to be accused of doing something like this, you could not wish a more horrible experience on anyone.”
She added: “We live in the hope that [Gus] is still out there somewhere.”
Earlier this year, former New South Wales detective Vincent Hurley said the police investigation “may take years” to reach an outcome but that they wouldn’t give up.
“The police will continually follow up this until it’s solved,” said the criminologist, as per the ABC.
“It might take one, it might take three, it might take five years, but eventually someone will be held to account.”
